This invention has to do with knock-down boxes and more particularly is concerned with a knock-down racking box for storage of clothes hangers such as are used to hang clothing in department and specialty stores for inspection by the customer.
It has become common for department and specialty stores which display their women's, men's and children's clothing on hangers to remove the hanger from the garment prior to packing the garment for the customer to take home. This practice has been introduced primarily as a cost-saving measure. As will be appreciated there is a rapid accumulation of clothes hangers at or about the packing station and the orderly storage of these hangers has become a considerable problem. Formerly, the practice was to casually toss the hangers into a large bin from which they could only be difficultly retrieved, if they were retrieved at all. More recently the practice has been instituted of stacking the hangers in a suitable container which maintained the hangers unentangled, the hooks not being intertwined with the shoulder portions and/or the clips found on the hangers. With the growth in the practice of so storing the hangers, the numbers of hanger racks being provided to the trade has increased and new problems have arisen in the economical handling of this business.
Typically, racking boxes for hangers have been vertically extended containers into which the hangers are stacked singly. The construction of these boxes has been a sheet of corrogated board or like sheet material folded into the desired rectangular cross-section overlapped at one side edge and stapled there for use. These containers are generally manufactured in one location and shipped to another and for this purpose may be flattened in their stapled condition. It will be evident that such a flattening process leaves a double and in some instances a triple thickness of paper board or corrogated board and may well strain the connection between the side edges at the location of the staples. Moreover, in this type of construction where the edge margin used to interconnect the front and side panels, for example with staples, projects into the interior space of the container, the introduction of hangers into the box may be impeded and tilting of hangers in the box encountered with a consequent reduction of capacity of box and/or possible entanglement of the hangers in the box.
It is therefore a major object of the present invention to provide a knock-down racking box for storage of clothes hangers which has single wall construction in all vertical walls, with no overlap, which is readily assembled on the site and which can be shipped as a single thickness box blank and yet when assembled provides a rigid high capacity hanger rack.
Other objects of the invention will become apparent hereinafter.
The objects of the invention are realized in a knock-down racking box for storage of clothes hangers of the type having right and left arm portions and an outwardly projecting portion therebetween carrying hook structure. The box comprises a unitary sheet material blank folded along predetermined lines into an elongated, generally rectangular configuration of a size to receive a series of hangers in horizontally disposed and vertically aligned relation, the box configuration being defined by a bottom wall having left and right hand slot openings formed therein, a rear wall folded upward from the bottom wall, opposed side walls fold-connected to the rear wall and extending upward from the bottom wall, left and right hand front wall panels fold-connected to their adjacent side walls, the front wall panels cooperating to define an elongated opening centrally of the box front adapted to receive the hanger neck portions in guiding relation with hook structure thereon exposed beyond the plane of the front wall panels; and fastening means maintaining the walls and panels in their folded relation, the fastening means comprising downward continued extents of the left and right hand front wall panels transversly scored to form flaps separably interlocking respective ones of said left and right hand bottom wall slots in box configuration-defining relation.
The knock-down racking box according to the invention further includes these features: downward continued extents of the side walls transversely scored to overlie the box bottom wall; handle means defined by the rear wall opposite the upper portion of the elongated front opening; each of said front wall panel flaps including a tapered portion underlying the bottom wall and an enlarged tab portion beyond the tapered portion thereof separably interfitting the opposing bottom wall slot; and single wall construction of the box throughout its vertical length above the bottom wall. Typically, the box sheet material comprises corrogated board and in such embodiments each front wall panel flap may underlie the bottom wall and include the tapered portion and a relatively enlarged tab portion beyond the tapered portion separably interfitting the opposing bottom wall slot, the downward continued extents of side walls folded to overlie the bottom wall, the front wall panel tabs standing upwardly within the box and the side wall continued extents being locally relieved to accommodate the tabs within the box, the rear wall being apertured to define handle means opposite the upper portion of the elongated front opening.
For these purposes the invention provides in a blank form a knock-down single vertical wall construction racking box blank comprising unitary corrogated board sheet material locally scored and cut to define a bottom wall having left and right hand tab-receiving slot openings, a rear wall foldable upward from the bottom wall, opposed side walls fold-connected to the rear wall and extendable upward from the bottom wall, left and right hand front wall panels, fold connected to their adjacent side wall, the front panels being cut to cooperatively define an elongated opening centrally of the box front and tab-carrying portions separably interlocking each front panel with the bottom wall at the slots therein and in underlying relation in the assembled condition of the blank.